There are two key questions that rolled out of the Alex Edler reveal last week.

At No. 1, with a bullet, is should there be long-term concern about news he is rehabbing a bulging disc under team supervision?

The obvious answer is obvious: of course.

Edler underwent surgery, because of a bulging disc, in January 2011. He continued to experience back spasms throughout the next season. He missed practices and was forced to leave a game in December. And he just happens now to be looking for an extension that would make him the Canucks’ highest-paid defenceman.

That’s enough for at least mild concern, even if the Canucks brass says it has none, believing his current back issue is temporary.

“After consultation with our doctors and the back specialist, they think it’s something which will correct itself,” Canucks assistant GM Laurence Gilman said.

But even if we assume this isn’t another Cody Hodgson situation and the doctors and specialist are spot on this time, it raises alarm bells. Is this problem one that will recur throughout Edler’s career?

Even without the back injury in the equation, the Edler negotiation hasn’t been an easy one. He’s asking for the type of money you pay a No. 1 blueliner, and he’s the second best, sometimes third, defenceman on the team.

The Canucks have carefully crafted an internal salary cap and are not anxious to blow it up for the inconsistent Edler.

So, you can understand then why the Canucks are choosing, and it was a choice, to pay his salary, and closely monitor this back with their own medical staff, the same back they were trying to invest heavily in before the CBA expired.

And that leads us to question No. 2.

Will the decision to keep Edler on the payroll during this labour standoff help when the negotiations to re-sign him resume?

The more sinister among us have suggested ponying up now for Edler is some quid pro quo. He gets paid during a lockout, and later gives the Canucks a sweetheart, hometown discount contract when the NHL resumes.

Gilman dismissed this notion as ludicrous and pointed out the team is doing the same thing for Jason Garrison, who has been hobbled by a nagging groin injury. Garrison is signed for the next six years.

And really, it’s a huge leap.

If the NHL and the NHLPA agree to a deal in the next month, the money Edler will have been paid won’t be significant when you consider he’s talking about an extension worth more than $30 million.

His back issue fit under the Canucks’ broad interpretation of “hockey-related injuries” that allow teams to continue to pay players during the lockout who have been deemed unfit to play.

Essentially, if a player is injured during his employment as a hockey player, he shall receive his salary for as long as he is unable to perform.

A club physician would be the one to decide whether to clear a player.

Different teams have different definitions. The Florida Panthers’ blue-chip defenceman Erik Gudbranson had shoulder surgery after sustaining an injury during offseason training. He isn’t scheduled to be back until January. But the Panthers concluded it wasn’t hockey-related because it didn’t happen during the season. They decided to lock him out with the rest of their non-injured players.

The Canucks went the other way, and it feeds the narrative that they often make decisions from the players’ perspective. That narrative has been one of the reasons the Canucks have been able to sign some players to deals considered discounts.

“If [Edler] wiped out water skiing and then started complaining about back pain, it would be a little different,” Gilman said. “That’s obviously not a hockey-related injury.

“The thing about it is, if you take the position that, if the guy who gets injured in the offseason is on his own time and his own responsibility, you may not have a player lift a weight once the season is over.

“You could argue Sami Salo was doing his own thing when he was playing floorball in the summer. But if you take that position with the guy, your players aren’t going to do anything in the offseason except sit on their butts.

“Alex was fine. He was skating with our players and he began to suffer some pain following the skates. If that’s not a hockey-related injury, I don’t know what is.”

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